Come Tumbling Down and Across the Green Grass Fields (Wayward Children #5 & #6) by Seanan McGuire

Wayward Children series
Every Heart a Doorway
Down Among the Sticks and Bones
Beneath the Sugar Sky
In an Absent Dream

I was so excited when I finished the last book in this series to find that this book was available immediately as an audiobook, so I jumped on it. Come Tumbling Down is the fifth book in the Wayward Children series by Seanan McGuire. She also reads the audiobook, so if you're a fan of author-narrated audiobooks, maybe give these a listen. These are also really short, so it's only a four- or five-hour commitment to an audiobook, which is a nice treat. 

In this book, we find ourselves briefly back and Eleanor West's school when two girls come in through a doorway that suddenly opens in the basement. One of them is Jack, one of the sisters who was the focus of the second book in this series.  But something is wrong with Jack and pretty soon all the students (Christopher, Cade, Sumi, Cora) are going back with Jack through the door to fix everything.

I wasn't as riveted by this book as I have been by previous books in the series. I didn't need this book. Jack and her sister Jill were well served by Down Among the Stick and Bones and this book frankly took away some of the power of the ending of that book.

All that said, this is a powerful book about chosen family and finding your place in the a world. 3.5/5 stars

Line of note:

Her mind, brilliant, traitorous, prone to devouring itself, did not stop fretting, but at least she was in control again. It was odd to think of one's own mind as the enemy. It wasn't always. The tending to obsession and irrational dread was matched by focus and attention to detail... (timestamp 1:23:10)

Yes. Yes. And more yes. 

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Up next was the audiobook for Across the Green Grass Fields. The narrator here is Annamarie Carlson, but it wasn't as jolting to switch narrators as I thought it would be. 

Regan is well-loved by her parents, but when things get bad at school, she runs away and finds a door. Behind that door is a world with centaurs and unicorns and as time passes by, she feels more and more at home in this world than in the world where she was born.

This is another short listen (four hours!). I liked it well enough, but I didn't love it like I loved some of the earlier books in the series. I like the representation (intersex main character), I like that McGuire builds a new world in each book (talking animals!), I like that McGuire is consistent in her themes about the importance of found family and being true to who you are regardless of sex or sexuality, and I like that these books exist for its young adult audience. 

 

I think if I had a young person in my life who was struggling because of one reason or another, I'd happily send them to this series. But I was never a horse girl and the thought of choosing this world to live the rest of your life in didn't make a lot of sense to me. Maybe it would to someone else.

Didn't stop me from downloading the next audiobook in the series!

3.5/5 stars

Line of note:

She still levered herself to her feet, shrugged off her pack, and dug through it until she found a rag that had started its existence as a piece of the jeans she'd been wearing when she stumbled through her door. It was buttery soft, softer than denim had any right to be, worn down to threads and memory. (timestamp 3:17:07)

Does anyone else have clothes that are just so soft and worn you can't get rid of them, even thought they really are unsightly?

Appearances of the word hat:

None! I noticed no mentions of the word hat in either book!